Gravity – Chapter 9
Monday morning, 8 o'clock. Malcolm couldn't believe that he had been standing on a windy cliff wondering if he would ever step in his office again a mere couple of weeks ago. And feeling weirdly torn about that realisation. Now that he was back in Downing Street and starting to experience the effects of not having slept for 24 hours, he came to re-evaluate his moment of self doubt. Feeling torn shouldn't have been a cause for worry. No. The fact that he had missed this place, even for a second, was the major concern.
Sure, he had expected things to have gone hay-fucking-wire in his absence. He just hadn't imagined that almost everyone involved in government would have started dancing to what he liked to call the tune of the headless chickens. Hell, the Irish could have invaded the country without anyone noticing. Maybe that's what had happened. It would explain a lot.
Jamie had done his best, of course. Malcolm knew that he had. But really - what the fuck went wrong? What had the world turned into? The place was a mess! Health had dumped all its shit on the other departments, the Treasury had let out that they were planning huge cuts in the next few months, Transports wanted to triple the number of speed cameras on the motorways, and don't let him start on fucking DoSAC. Jesus Christ! They made the Green party look like a very real and promising alternative.
He knew who to blame for all this. And boy, did that feel good – focusing his anger on one single person. One very deserving person. Nicholson. That fucking Oxbridge backstabbing pompous twat. Getting rid of him would be difficult and time consuming. But Malcolm knew he would take disquieting pleasure in it - he would make it last for as long as he could bare it. Just for the sheer pleasure of watching the gradual realisation that he had lost his battle against him settle in his eyes.
Because no one could replace him. No one could sit in his chair. No one.
For now, though, he needed to set up a list of priorities. And making sure the Department of Sod All and Cack didn't fuck up the Special Needs Bill was the first one. Off to the new PFI Building he went. Four ministers in one place. If that wasn't Shangri fucking-la then he'd eat his pants.
On that subject, his pants thankfully still fit. But he couldn't say the same for the rest of his clothes. He had enlisted the help of his faithful Personal Assistant, Sam, last night, when he had realised - standing like a fool in his bedroom in front of his mirror - that his two-week stint in psychological gaol had had the effect of a heroine diet.
Malcolm didn't own a set of scales, but he was pretty sure he'd lost close to two stones. Too bad he didn't have that much extra weight to spare. The new-found absence of the slightly protruding gut he had been carrying could be considered as nice, perhaps. But the fact that he now looked like a fucking kid trying on his father's clothes wasn't. It was bad. Very bad.
The suit jackets and shirts would be okay for now – he hadn't exactly shrunk at the shoulders. The arms actually felt a bit tighter. Probably all that swimming he had done. On the other hand, he couldn't exactly go to the office with his trousers around his ankles. Simply tightening his belt made him look like he was wearing fucking nappies. This new appearance didn't project respect and confidence. This was a nightmare.
Malcolm had hesitated calling someone else for help with this, but... No. She probably wasn't even back yet, and he didn't have time to focus on his horrible, gut wrenching, god awful guilt at the moment. Not yet. But he would. Oh, yes... He would.
When he had opened his door at eleven to find Sam behind it, they had both frozen. His PA's eyes had filled, and she had given him an unexpected yet fierce hug. After quickly disengaging from his grasp and wiping her tear stained cheeks, she proceeded to punch his arm. Hard.
"Ow!" Malcolm exclaimed, taken aback.
"You deserve it, for all you've put me through these past weeks. I was so worried!"
"Sorry."
"Idiot." A beat. "You owe me such a raise for this."
His no-nonsense PA was back and he laughed, nodding.
Sam had proven essential to his return. Of course she had. Managing to get two pairs of his trousers refitted by his tailor before 8AM. Then finding him the address of a good barber who made him look human again. Once his beard and woolly hair had gone, he had realised how scary he actually looked. He hadn't just lost weight around his stomach. He looked emaciated. Unsafe. Dangerously so when he lowered his brow in a scowl. Good, very good.
Malcolm gradually came to realise during the day that he felt strangely vindictive towards Hugh Abbott and his team. And yes, okay, particularly towards that fucking insufferable tosser Reeder. What he didn't know was whether his attitude towards the DoSAC people had worsened now that he knew they had been driving Clara up the wall in his absence.
Clara. Where was she? Had she arrived home safe? Was her car working? Was she at work? Here somewhere in the building, even? Should he call? Did she hate him for having abandoned her last night?
He had to stop thinking about her.
Once he had made sure DoSAC saw the correct expert for the Super Schools Bill, he received a call from Jamie. That made him jump, even now. He had spent the day looking over his shoulder and expecting bad news, despite his colleague's somewhat reassuring call that very morning to let him now that he was safe to go back to work.
Malcolm quickly took relative cover in the staircase – relative because that stupid piece of architectural shitty wonder was echoey as hell.
"Anything new, Jamie?" he promptly asked.
"Some good, and some not so good."
"Start with the not so good."
"It might take a while to see the end of this," the younger Scot rushed in to say.
"I won't be cleared anytime soon?" Malcolm bemoaned.
"Well, not exactly."
"What the fuck do you mean?"
"What I mean is that the Met are looking into a new line of inquiry but they haven't dropped all charges against you yet, according to Sarah."
"What new line of inquiry?" Malcolm asked, "They found something else?"
"Catherine Hadley was in the log. She was in Downing Street at a time you or Sam weren't there. A time she could have easily slipped into your office and done whatever the fuck she wanted with your computer."
"When?"
"On the morning of the 24th of December."
"Christmas Eve," Malcolm added unnecessarily, "I only got there late, it was snowing. I wasn't even supposed to come to the office that day," he remembered.
Malcolm then stopped on the last step, having reached the end of the staircase.
"But wait, that doesn't make any fucking sense, that's the day I deleted Hewitt!"
"Precisely," supplied Jamie. "Look, it's all my fault, I didn't think to check the logs before the 24th. I only checked the dates after."
"It's not your fault," pressed Malcolm forcefully, tired of hearing that sentence coming from all the people he held dear.
He scratched his scalp energetically with his free hand to force himself to focus, missing the longer hair that used to be there. Think. He needed to think. This new development was distracting him, and he didn't have time to rehash everything with Jamie at the moment, he had too much to do.
"Call me back if you learn anything new," he finally uttered.
"Will do, Malc."
"And Jamie? Thanks. I wouldn't be there if it wasn't for you."
"You better not make me fucking regret it, big man. Go and bollock some more people, I can't be the only one doing all the grunt work."
Malcolm smiled and hung up. His mood quickly evaporated when he thought some more about what his colleague had said. If this new element proved conclusive, it meant that Catherine Hadley - possibly aided by her sister and Hewitt - had acted before the press registry deletion. Which meant that it had never been the triggering event. He had been completely wrong.
He sighed, and forced himself to think about something else. Raising his head towards the high ceiling, he managed to make out a few faces he recognised up there.
"Get back to work, all of you!" he shouted, feeling infinitely better.
Friday evening, seven o'clock. Clara had barely slept, this past week. When she wasn't killing herself at work over the Special Needs Bill, she found herself wondering whether the last two weeks had been a bad dream. To say that she was confused was putting it mildly, hence the twisting and turning over the mattress at night that proved as resting as pondering where the hell she would find enough money to have her car fixed.
To make matters worse, she couldn't even rely on the soothing presence of her dog at the moment. As it turned out, the last weeks had clearly not been a dream for him, and founding himself scooped up in her tiny flat all day long after having experienced freedom in its purest form proved impossible for the poor animal. So off to Martha he had gone. Clara had felt bad about asking her to take him back so soon, but she did have a garden - as tiny as it was - and Mickey would be with him all day, given that he worked from home.
She wasn't even excited about the coming weekend, since she knew that the whole circus would start once more on Monday. Still, at least she had been able to secretly cheer over a small victory today, when Hugh Abbot had quite simply signed the proverbial end of his career by lying – for the second time - in front of a Select Committee. Her mirth had to be discreet, though, because they were supposedly on the same boat with that Bill, and both their departments had to support it. However stupid and pointless it was.
Clara longed for the day when she wouldn't have to spend half her time with DoSAC people. Namely, when the Bill actually passed. She didn't mind having to go to their new building. It was quite nice, after all. What she minded was the fact that it housed four different departments. Which meant that she had four times more chances to bump into Malcolm when she went there. It hadn't happened yet, but she had been very careful. And it wasn't that she didn't want to see him – because she did, oh, she did – it was that she had no idea what she would actually tell him if they found themselves face to face. Smile? Ask him how he was? Wishing him a nice day as though she hadn't basically planned to run away with him and change her whole life for him a few days before? As though he hadn't unexpectedly become the most important aspect of her life? As though watching him exit her broken car on Sunday hadn't broken her very soul in the process?
Maybe she was overreacting. Maybe.
After all, she had known him for what, two months? So they'd slept together a handful of times, so what? That didn't mean they were now supposed to barely know how to go about their days without thinking about the other. Even if it were true in her case.
As it were, Clara hadn't been able to completely escape his presence during the week. She had managed to only catch glimpses of him from afar, which was a good thing - because he had looked both terrible and wonderful at the same time. Terrible because his new, fiercely sharp profile scared her more than she would like to admit. Yet wonderful because she couldn't help but admire his resilience and rejoice in his success at finding his way back here.
She wasn't proud of her head-in-the-sand-and-hopes-he-disappears reaction. This wasn't like her. She was used to face her problems straight on. She was a grown woman with wit and pluck at the ready. She didn't let a mere bloke reduce her to this state.
Similarly, Clara chose to believe that her refusal to answer Jamie's calls had been caused by her too hectic schedule. She wasn't acting out of childish stubbornness. No way. She wasn't sulking or hoping the man would understand that she wanted to be left alone and not talk about it. Or, even worse, him.
There she was again – couldn't even pronounce his name in her own head. How ridiculous was that?
What next? She would swoon next time he brushed past her? Pen him a heartfelt letter she never would find the courage to send him?
No. This was Friday night. She would stop thinking about work and him. She would order a pizza, open a bottle of red, and fall asleep watching the least romantic film she could find.
Unfortunately, her plans promptly went out the window when someone knocked. Knowing instinctively that this wouldn't be her neighbour asking to borrow her rolling pin, she still opened the door, wincing internally.
Finding him on the other side, her resolutions went out the same way as her plans, and she lasted all of four seconds before launching herself at him.
